World Press Photo Gallery

As a sponsor of the World Press Photo 07 exhibition in Toronto, The Walrus is pleased to present a critical analysis of a selection of the images.

by 2007 prizewinners

As a sponsor of the World Press Photo 07 exhibition in Toronto, The Walrus is pleased to present a critical analysis of a selection of the images.

Photographer: Lorenzo Cicconi Massi, Italy, Contrasto

Description : Students at the Beijing Guoan Football Club school practice heading techniques. The school is in an isolated spot about 70 kilometres from Beijing, and has some 200 pupils between the ages of fifteen and eighteen. The boys all board at the school, and the curriculum focuses entirely on physical training and soccer techniques. On weekends they play matches against other Chinese youth teams.

Comment from Myles McCutcheon, photo editor of Chatelaine Magazine in Toronto:

Form. Balance. Timing. Three words that jump to the front of my mind when I first saw this photograph. This image works for me on many levels. For one, it forced me to ask myself how did the photographer do it? Is this a studio shot compiled in post? Are these anonymous models reacting to direction? The lighting, the moment, the lightness or is it the darkness? It almost seems too perfect to be an unrehearsed photo.

But it is. It is only after some time that I noticed the top of the net in the background, which immediately adds the necessary context to the shot. The shape of the players, arms used as counterbalances, are too random to be directed. I can hear the moment in this photo (voices silent, feet shuffling on turf), which tells me I am experiencing it on more than just a visual level.

This photo is also poetic - the balls seem to be in perfect sync with one another suggesting rhythm and structure. It is also an image of contrasts. Both stoic and fluid; black and white; light and dark.

As with all great photographs, time is frozen in this frame and I think that this is the most important part of this picture – timing. The photographer found that moment with this image. Releasing their shutter milliseconds sooner or later and the impressiveness seen here would have fallen short; arms would have been down, balls misplaced.

In short, this image leaves me questioning which for me is the role of a great photograph. I want to know more. But I don't, as the perfect timing seen here will have been lost.

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